Counterpart International's government and local partners in four countries will deliver independent disaster relief after receving $3.78 million worth of emergency supplies. The handover was celebrated at a ceremony in Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyz Republic and Tajikistan in March and April receiving widespread media coverage.

The Ministry of Emergency Situations in Armenia, the Emergency Management Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Georgia and FOCUS Humanitarian Assistance in Kyrgyz Republic and Tajikistan will resume responsibility for the disaster packages.

“The Department of State, as well as Counterpart International, has had strong, impactful relationships with all of these organizations and this transfer has assured that the Department of State disaster packages will continue to be used in an effective manner in support of victims of disasters whenever they occur,” Jerry Oberndorfer, the State Department’s Director for Humanitarian Assistance of the Office of the Coordinator of U.S. Assistance to Europe and Eurasia said.

Counterpart has maintained the U.S. State Department pre-positioneddisaster packages under its Community and Humanitarian Assistance Program (CHAP)from 2006 to 2014 and has a long history of responding to disasters and emergencies in the former Soviet countries. For instance, in Georgia, Counterpart responded to four disasters including the heavy rainstorms in June 2011 in Shida Kartli that triggered mudslides and floods that killed several people and damaged about 1,500 homes. The program also released disaster supplies during civil unrest that broke out in the southern cities of the Kyrgyz Republic in June 2010 and an earthquake in the rural Rasht Valley in Tajikistan in 2007 which damaged and destroyed more than 1,400 homes.

Since 1995, Counterpart has coordinated the distribution of approximately $1 billion worth of humanitarian assistance to individuals in need through its network of local partner organizations.